Starlit Revolution
by Fun Pak 64
Summary: The invading force has taken down XCOM, and convinced the Monarchs of Pop Star to surrender the planet to them and ADVENT. XCOM's Commander has been captured by the invaders. The Hero of the Stars vanished after the destruction of XCOM HQ. That was thirty years ago. Now, the reborn XCOM must rescue their Commander, find the Hero and overthrow ADVENT. It all starts with this.


"Advent again assures all of you that the celebrations of Unification Day will continue as they have been planned."

An egg-shaped floating being with two hovering gloves turns away from the screen playing the news broadcast and starts to float towards the giant statue visible above the skyline whilst seemingly speaking to himself in a squeaky voice. "Wonderful."

A Puffball at the other side of the statue walks towards his target steadily, and one of the Advent security towers casts a red spotlight onto one of the other Dreamlanders also proceeding in the direction of the statue. The other Dreamlander is stopped by some of the Advent Peacekeepers "Almost to position, they're definitely busy today."

The floating being - a Halcandran - reaches the front of the security line before the statue, and is stopped when the scanner glows red. The Officer in command at the security line slams the butt of their rifle into the Halcandran's body and he is knocked to the ground.

As the Halcandran glares up at the Officer, the Puffball attaches a pink orb surrounded with a gelatinous capsule to the side of one of the Advent vehicles and begins to walk away. The Halcandran floats back to his regular height and presses a glove to the side of his hood. "Now!"

Upon being given the signal, the Puffball triggers a detonator, and the Gooey Bomb explodes, destroying the vehicle and launching the Advent troops to the ground.

"Alright, Gatecrasher - your turn."

Gatecrasher 1 and 2 pull on their combat gear and prepare their weapons, before grabbing onto the Warp Stars that will bring them down from the Starcutter to the operations area. They climb onto the Stars and brace for impact just before the Warp Stars carrying them crash into the ground in front of the target. The gravity-reduction burst from the Warp Stars' landing safely bring Crasher 1 and 2 into the fray.

They advance into the cover of two large screens on both sides of the path, and spot the large force of Advent Troopers blocking the doors of the Gene Lab.

"We'll have to go through them to get to the package. Keep unnoticed until absolutely necessary." The voice of the mission leader from aboard the Halberd broadcasts through Crasher 1 and 2's earpieces as they advance to cover which just about keeps them hidden from the Advent Troopers.

"We'll have to maximize our advantage from surprise if we want to succeed against their numbers." Crasher 1's voice is barely enough to register on the earpiece, and thus was mostly drowned out by the explosion to the east of the lab. An Officer emerges from inside the gene lab, and commands just less than half of the Troopers to follow them to the site of the explosion, leaving four soldiers behind.

Crasher 1 fires as soon as the Officer is out of site, eliminating one of the Troopers with a single burst of gunfire. The Poppy Bro ducks back into his cover as the Troopers pull up their weapons and begin returning a hail of fire from their gauss weaponry. Crasher 2 moves up to take cover behind a vehicle and opens fire, killing another Trooper.

The remainders of the enemy pod move forward into better cover, with one Trooper continuing to fire upon Crasher 1 but the other one takes a flanking shot against Crasher 2, killing the Blade Knight with five precise shots to the head.

"Crasher 2 is down! I'm moving to return fire!" Crasher 1 yells through his communicator as he advances into a flanking position against the Trooper which took out Crasher 2 and executes it with a burst of fire from a relatively close range. The last trooper begins to move into cover, but is sent to the ground by a pistol shot from behind. Its voice is heard as it begins to call reinforcements, but a few more shots finish off the Trooper.

"Central Officer Magolor, reporting." The Halcandran holsters his pistol and places a glove on the side of the Trooper, flipping it over and knocking off the mask. What's underneath is a Waddle Dee with a severely modified face, looking nothing like even the most scarred of that species.

"What happened to it?" questions another voice, as the Puffball walks up behind Magolor.

"It's a hybrid. A 'reward' from Advent for obeying them." replies Magolor, his grave tone at contrast with his naturally high voice. "I've heard rumors about this, but I never…" The Puffball's sentence trails off as he thinks about just how many Advent Troopers like this exist. "Once we manage to recover what we're here for, everything is going to change." Magolor looks up towards the now-unguarded Gene Lab and begins moving towards it. "Let's keep moving."

A red flare lights on the path behind them, and the Puffball whips around. "The reinforcement call went through, we have to hurry!" Magolor and the Puffball starting sprinting, with the Puffball stopping to scoop up a scope dropped by one of the slain Troopers. Crasher 1 moves behind a car to use as cover, and prepares for Overwatch.

Two Troopers and an Officer drop from the Advent Transport, and Crasher 1 shoots down one of them as they hit the ground. After taking the shot, Crasher 1 falls back to further away cover, and empties his assault rifle aiming at the Officer. None of the shots connect, but it forces the Officer to stop firing and take cover, and the Puffball uses the opening to move up to a locked door and pull out a tablet computer.

His paws fly in a flurry of typing, and the door slides open as the Puffball puts the computer away and pulls out his rifle. Magolor moves up to a silver tube with the Advent logo on it, and pulls a lever. The tube opens to reveal a Puffball-shaped bodysuit, and Magolor slams his so-far unused sniper rifle into the glass to break it. He puts the rifle away and grabs the suit as it falls towards him.

The mission leader's voice fills the comms, sounding urgent. "Almost all nearby Advent forces are on their way to your location. You have to leave, now!" This is followed by the sounds of gauss fire, and the body of Crasher 1 hitting the ground.

"We need another way out of here, right now!" Magolor begins carrying the suit towards the back wall after the Puffball lobs a grenade and blows a huge hole in it. One of the Advent Troopers fire on the Puffball, but he dodges by diving towards the newly-made gap in the wall. The Officer moves into view and scores a number of hits on Magolor, whom miraculously stays standing.

"Daroach, we need an evac!" Magolor yells over the comms and is met with a "Copy!" and a blue flare lighting just in front of Magolor. He runs into the area around the flare and a Warp Star appears in front of him, which he grabs and flies upwards with. The Puffball follows suit, being propelled into the Starcutter, which closes the Warp Star bay and soars into the night.


End file.
